Ringo Starr’s Childhood Home to Be Demolished

The home [lastfm]Beatles [/lastfm]drummer [lastfm]Ringo Starr[/lastfm] was born in is set to be demolished.

Liverpool council want to demolish the building in Madryn Street, Toxteth, as part of widespread regeneration of the area.

Speaking to the Liverpool Echo, when asked whether the house should be saved, council leader Joe Anderson said, “My own personal view is no.”

“If it was next door to [lastfm]Paul McCartney[/lastfm]’s house, you could make the argument, but given it is stuck in the middle of a block of terraces which have to be demolished, that has to be taken into account.”

The decision has prompted a backlash, with presented and former MP Gyles Brandreth and Baywatch star Pamela Anderson both condemning the decision on ‘The One Show’ on BBC One on Wednesday night, Aug. 18.

A Liverpool council spokesman told the Liverpool Echo, “Ringo lived in Madryn Street for just a short time when he was a baby. This house has little true historic value.”

The council has asserted that Starr’s real family home is in Admiral Grove, where he lived for 20 years.

Philip Coppell, an official [lastfm]Beatles[/lastfm] tour guide, told the Daily Mail, “Whoever has approved this are complete idiots. The National Trust run [lastfm]Paul McCartney[/lastfm] and [lastfm]John Lennon[/lastfm]’s homes as tourist attractions and people come from all over the world to see them.

“Now they are planning to demolish the very building that Ringo was born in. It’s sheer lunacy … In the 1970s, the Cavern Club was demolished. People to this day shake their heads in disbelief at that. Yet even now it seems that we have really not learned any lessons.”

Council chiefs are negotiating to have the house taken apart, brick-by-brick, and rebuilt at the site of the new Museum of Liverpool.

In 2007, Starr himself dismissed plans to rebuild the house at the Museum of Liverpool, saying, “It made no sense to me. If you want to see where I come from, it’s no good putting me in the Wirral. It only works, as far as I can see, if it’s there [Madryn Street].”